EXPath

Packaging System

Unlike most the other modules, the Packaging System module does not define a set of
XPath functions, but rather a file format to package libraries written in some core
XML
technologies. The goal is to support XSLT, XQuery and XProc in a first time, but support
for other related technologies could be added in the future (like XML Schema, XForms,
etc.)
It also supports packaging of extension functions written in a processor-specific
way (for
instance in Java,) for mainstream processors. it is also extensible by third parties,
for
instance to support processor-dependent features.

Prototype for Saxon and eXist

The ideal situation would be to have support for this packaging system right into
the
various processors, tools and IDEs. Vendors will follow if there are enough users
of this
system, and users will follow if there is enough support into their tools. So to break
that
circle, we have to provide an implementation for various processors, even a partial
implementation. Doing so, we can get feedback from the community while defining the
module,
the idea being the module will be easier to explain and that will ease discussions
(by
having something concrete to discuss about...)

So you can find here a prototype implementation for Saxon, and another one for eXist.
They are not production-ready, but they should be stable enough to help you installing
and
managing the libraries using the Packaging System (all the EXPath module implementations,
of course, but we plan also to help writers of major XSLT and XQuery libraries to
package
their work, for instance the stylesheets for DocBook, XSLStyle, FunctX for both XSLT
and
XQuery, the stylesheets for DITA, the FXSL library, etc.)